Alicia Keys has admitted growing up in the music industry inspired her decision to go makeup-free.
The ‘Girl On Fire’ hitmaker previously went through a period of not wearing makeup as she rebelled against beauty standards, and she explained how she started to become aware of how she “wanted to feel”.
She told The Cut: “I started in the music world when I was 17 years old and you are told that you put on this and you wear this, you get yourself together and you get ready to perform.
“You get to transform and be in a place where you can identify how you want to express yourself.
“All of that is a beautiful part of growing and a beautiful part of being a woman is that you get to express yourself.”
The realization helped Alicia accept that she didn’t need all the makeup and fancy clothes to feel “beautiful”.
She added: “It opened my eyes to how I didn’t feel comfortable or beautiful if I didn’t have my armor on, and if I didn’t have all my face and hair and pretty things and nice clothes on that somehow I was less than beautiful or just less than.
“I realized, like, Whoa, what’s underneath all that?’ It allowed me to have a conversation with myself about how I wanted to feel and even what I wanted to let go of.”
She clarified that she doesn’t think “makeup was the armor” so much as everything “put together”.
